Beyond the horse race and the politics of personality most frequently covered by the media, there are some significant differences in the policy approaches of the 2024 presidential candidates. Many of these have been highlighted in political ads: domestic economic policies that affect our wallets, approaches to international relations that deal with a world fraught with conflict, immigration policies, and social policies that affect families and health care. What are the policy differences of the two candidates? Which policies are controlled by the president and which will require cooperation with the legislative branch? How could these policies affect our standing in the world?
Join fellow UW alumni and friends online for a livestream and Q & A with a panel of experts who will discuss these topics. The talk will be moderated by Mike Knetter, CEO of the Wisconsin Foundation and Alumni Association.
Speakers
Mark Copelovitch is Professor of Political Science and Public Affairs and Director of the Center for European Studies. He studies and teaches international political economy and international relations, with a focus on the politics of international money and finance, the International Monetary Fund and the European Union, and the political impact of economic shocks. From 2022-25, Copelovitch holds the European Union’s Jean Monnet Chair in the EU and the Global Economy. Copelovitch has written two books, The International Monetary Fund in the Global Economy: Banks, Bonds, and Bailouts (Cambridge, 2010) and Banks on the Brink: Global Capital, Securities Markets, and the Political Roots of Financial Crises (with David Singer, Cambridge, 2020). He is currently Vice Chair of the European Union Studies Association.
Kim Ruhl is the Curt and Sue Culver Professor of Economics at UW–Madison. He is also codirector of the Center for Research on the Wisconsin Economy (CROWE). Ruhl’s research focuses on international economics, models of firm heterogeneity, and national income accounting. He is currently a research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research and a special sworn employee of the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis, where he studies the ways that multinational firms produce and sell goods and services around the world.
Tim Smeeding MS’72, PhD’75 is the Lee Rainwater Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Public Affairs and Economics in the Robert M. La Follette School of Public Affairs. A nationally renowned expert on anti-poverty policy, Smeeding’s recent work has focused on social and economic mobility across generations, inequality of income, consumption and wealth, and poverty in national and cross-national contexts. He was the founding director of the Luxembourg Income Study from 1983 to 2006 and served as director of the Institute for Research on Poverty from 2008 to 2014. He is the coeditor or author of seven books, including SNAP Matters: How Food Stamps Affect Health and Well Being (Stanford University Press, 2015); From Parents to Children: The Intergenerational Transmission of Advantage (Russell Sage Foundation, 2012); and The Oxford Handbook of Economic Inequality (Oxford University Press, 2009).
A recording and recap of the livestream will be available on uwalumni.com after the event.
This event is hosted by the Wisconsin Alumni Association®.
